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That's a bit backwards.
Instant runoff voting makes it so ranking a second choice can't hurt your first choice. But voting honestly for your first choice instead of e.g. staying home could cause your second choice to lose and your last choice to win.
That happened in the recent Alaskan election. If a bunch of Palin voters stayed home, they'd have gotten Begich. Instead, Palin voters single-handedly elected Democrat by voting honestly.
That's their point though. The current winners know they wouldn't be the first choice if we had a system that allowed honest voting. It might save them against republicans, but it gives progressives even more of a chance.
EDIT: Also sure, if Palin voters would've voted strategically their side might've won. I'm not sure if it's because they fell for the trappings of FPtP, because they were unwilling to vote for a moderate and thus bet on the wrong candidate etc. But voting for the non-incumbent as their first vote would've been safer as it'd allow them to still be a Palin voter if Begich lost in round 1 as he did. I don't think the situation is terrible, as under FPtP the only strategy would be for Begich voters to vote for Palin (full stop) which clearly they didn't even want to do as their second choice.
There were actually 2 elections here.
The special election in September held because of Don Youngs death, and a general election in November.
In the special election, Peltola started out with 74,817 votes, 39.7% of the total. Begich had 52,536.
If 5,804 people who voted Palin 1st Begich 2nd stayed home, Palin would have been eliminated. Begich would have gotten a bit under 28k more votes and Peltola would have gotten about 3.5k more votes. That puts Begich at about 80k, and Peltola at about 78k.
My point is that ranked choice is not a system that allows honest voting. Much as in plurality, voters vote honestly at their own risk.
There are systems that do, and also systems that make better tradeoffs balancing later-no-harm against favorite betrayal.
I get what you mean now, but I think it's significant that many Begich voters didn't want Palin if they'd rather the other side win. Or not ranking anyone at all, which might be an issue of R messaging or unwillingness to support a different candidate.
Palin was also the incumbent, which means people will be likely to vote for them. I don't see that being avoided unless she would've dropped out and endorsed Begich but it sounds like they weren't on good terms.
Yes different ranking systems could be better (though it is nuanced), but it's still a massive step up from FPtP.
~~Also Palin voters staying home wouldn't have helped.~~ EDIT: More correct point added above
Most other voting systems would actually have elected Begich.
He was the Condorcet winner; voters preferred him over Palin and voters preferred him over Peltola.
That's a stretch, and you're likely assuming that all Palin voters would vote for Begich. Again Peltola already had 48.8% in round 1 and wasn't the incumbent.
I also don't think weaker wide appeal (beyond majority) is the best way, as that seems like a potential race to a position-less (or simply inoffensive but ineffective) candidate. Though in this case it seems close, at least if it's red vs blue moderates.
Also sure, if Palin voters would've voted strategically their side might've won. I'm not sure if it's because they fell for the trappings of FPtP, because they were unwilling to vote for a moderate and thus bet on the wrong candidate etc. But voting for the non-incumbent as their first vote would've been safer as it'd allow them to still be a Palin voter if Begich lost in round 1 as he did. I don't think the situation is terrible, as under FPtP the only strategy would be for Begich voters to vote for Palin (full stop) which clearly they didn't even want to do as their second choice.
So they actually published the complete ballot counts for this election.
With the ballots as cast, in head to head elections, Begich beats Peltola 87264-79126, and Begich beats Palin 100311-63249. This is mostly due to Begich getting more second place votes than either Peltola or Palin. For example, 33761 Palin voters put Begich second, 3437 put Peltola second, and 21526 bullet voted (i.e. put down no second choice). Similarly, Begich got about 10x the number of second place votes from Peltola voters that Palin got.
Score Voting activist Warren Smith has a write-up on viXra: https://vixra.org/abs/2210.0103